Alex Pereira is preparing for a light heavyweight championship rematch with Magomed Ankalaev on October 4th, and a former UFC heavyweight has offered his thoughts on that UFC 320 bout. Martin Buday appeared on Bowks Talking Bouts and touched on this subject after being released from the UFC and announcing he had re-signed with Oktagon MMA.
Buday previously fought on Pereira’s undercard at UFC 303 [when ‘Poatan’ finished Jiri Prochazka for the second time], and the former Oktagon MMA heavyweight champion bested Andrei Arlovski. When asked if this UFC 320 rematch will play out largely similar to the first fight between Pereira and Ankalaev, Buday said,
“When I saw the first fight between them, I think Alex was like a little bit different than he was in like his previous fights. So maybe he had some injury or something was happening that like the outside world of his camp didn’t know. So we will see. I’m really excited for the fight.”
“It will be like high level MMA. So it will be good fight and we will see how will Alex perform. Because like I think that first fight he wasn’t like in his typical pace or I don’t know how can I say that. But something like was looking a little bit off… Yeah, we will see. I’m excited for that.”
Alex Pereira, Magomed Ankalaev, and the concept that “every fight is different”
When mentioning the talking point that some fans had, which posited that perhaps Pereira was overly active and burnt out heading into the first fight with Ankalaev in March. In that context, when touching on the idea that ‘Poatan’ might have a more spirited showing in the sequel clash with his competitive schedule being more tempered as of late, Buday stated,
“Yeah. Something might happen. Yeah. He was like really active and maybe something happened in the camp or maybe it was like style to style. Maybe he didn’t catch up on the Magomed [Ankalaev] style or fighting style. So every fight is different. So, we will see how this fight will go.”